Syrian President Bashir Al-Assad: Is Syria the answer
to some of George W. Bush's Middle East nightmares?

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The best
way out of Iraq for the defeated George W. Bush is to speak with his worst
enemies. The advice given by Tony Blair was the genuine helping hand of
a friend: come to an understanding with Syria and Iran. It is a gesture that would
demand considerable political courage, but that could get back some maneuvering
room for the American government.

It isn't
necessary to like or support the regime of the Ayatollahs in Teheran to recognize
that Iran has become the region’s principal power, with direct influence that
extends to Herat, Afghanistan and Baghdad, Iraq, passing through a good part of
Lebanon, via Hezbullah. For those that like history, it is more or less the
same expanse shared 400 years ago by the last great Muslim empire [The Safavid Dynasty ] that had Isfahan, in the center of Iran, as its capital.

Excluding
the noise made by the long-winded President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who is barely third
in Iranian hierarchy, Iranians are much more cautious than the Americans when
dealing with questions involving the Middle East. They are still a good
distance from having The Bomb (which the Americans tolerate in the cases of
India and Pakistan). What the Iranians want, mainly, is an end to financial and
commercial sanctions in exchange for what the Americans most want in Iraq: some
kind of stability.

While
Iran thinks big and has time on its side (excluding a surprise Israeli attack),
Syria is in a desperate situation. The political isolation of Damascus is
grave, since the U.N. fingered the Syrian secret service as the principal mastermind
of the assassination of Lebanon's former Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri. The event,
which was carried out in Beirut, led to the withdrawal of Syrian troops from
Lebanon after 29 years of occupation.

The
Syrians have no oil or a nuclear program to use as a bargaining chip or pay
their military expenses, but they are essential in coming to any sort of long-term
understanding between Israel and the Arabs. Syrian influence in the Palestinian
territories is heavy, and the major radical Palestinian groups fighting Israel,
including Hamas, operate out of Damascus. In other words, Syria could
contribute greatly to providing a relief in tension between the Arabs and
Israelis.

It all
seems very rational, doesn’t it? The first question to deal with is how to come
to an understanding with Israel. The Iranian ascent is interpreted in Israel as
a direct threat to the very existence of the Jewish State. Israeli commentators
have pointed to an important fact in regard to the political psychology of the
Israeli government: they see the world through the prism of the Holocaust (be
it for electoral motives or not), and the words of Amhadinejad, preaching for
the destruction of Israel, are taken literally. For Israeli politicians, it
could not be otherwise.

More
complicated still is the lack of political direction exhibited by Israeli during
recent military events. Where former Prime Minister Ariel Sharon seemed to have
as a main objective - unilateral withdrawal, unilateral establishment of
boundaries and some type of stability - his successor appears confused. To the
point that, according to the newspaper The New York Times, the White
House has serious doubts about whether Ehud Olmert is sufficiently capable of
political and military analysis.

A good
part of the unconditional support that America has provided Israel stems from
the religious right, which considers it a Biblical duty to be on the side of
the Jewish State. It is this ideological component of American politics, side
by side with the Jewish barbarity in dealing with the Palestinian conflict that
has practically destroyed something that the United States still enjoyed 10
years ago: respect from both sides as a mediator.

The
Middle East is complicated above all by the fact that no question (the Iraqi
conflict, the Arab-Israel conflict, or Islamic radicalism) can be treated in
isolation, yet no comprehensive solution is possible without each isolated
conflict being resolved. Bush would now need extraordinary political audacity
to put the breaks on his friends and start talking to his enemies. But so far
he has shown only the impetuousness of ignorance.